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Change it yourself or go to

Change it yourself or go to the dealer. I had a company vehicle for a few years and had to take it to jiffy lube. I took our van there once. after about 3k miles I noticed a noise. It was because of low oil level. I found teeth marks from the wrench they used to put the filter ON. I took pictures and will NEVER USE ANYONE OTHER THAN MYSELF OR MY TRUSTED DEALER. On another note I took my CRX to the dealer for oil changes for years because I had an extended warranty. Short story is the engine blew and the warranty was not covered. The engine came out of gear and over revved. They said I did it on purpose. I bounce between changing oil myself and getting overcharged by the dealer. At $45 dollars to rotate the tires I do that myself.

hi

I had 2006 hybrid, and am

I had 2006 hybrid, and am using it for daily commute,seen i bought this baby I do regular maintenance by my self replacing oil, every 4k and and coolant every 30k transmission fluid every 40k, and my baby has over 200k miles, but still running like brand new..
thanks to me...

I am going to attempt to

I am going to attempt to change my own as well. I'm not sure where everyone keeps getting the price of $40-$60 but I got charged $99 for an oil change (that was "standard" for this IL dealership. The car has well over 90k now (it's an '07) and runs like a dream. My wife wants to trade it for another car but why would you do that when you put on 30k a year (at least). Personally, I would have gone with a toyota corolla (or the like) for all that highway driving but that's just me.

Thanks Jhunz for the info. I suspected that the hybrid is capable of doing 200k+ mileage. Trade-in currently is not worth the amount owed.

ps; check that tire inflation and use the same type as the dealer (we tried a different type and saw a 5mpg decrease - *winter tire*)

Hi all. I just finished

Hi all. I just finished changing the oil on a friend's hybrid. Since he has all the service records and has never let anybody but the dealership work on it, I thought I would post my findings. There were 3 missing clips on the belly pan. The bolt was striped and the crush washer nonexistent. The filter was so tight I had to stab it to remove it. He was told he needed a new air filter when they did a recall on his car; funny thing is itís new. And the last oil change cost him 60$ more than we paid to do it. I had no trouble changing the oil and found it to be quite simple actually. I will gladly go through the trouble of recycling the oil and purchasing the supplies to know that the bolts are on correctly and nothing was destroyed in the process.

Hi Greg. I'd agree, oil

Hi Greg. I'd agree, oil changes are not that difficult. You just need to be reasonably competent and careful. The one hitch I found with the Honda Civic Hybrid was getting the car up a bit higher to allow the plastic shield under the engine to swing down at it's hinge point. Either that or remove it completely.

We had bodywork done on ours recently, and the next time I changed the oil I found one of the two 10mm (socket size) bolts that hold the leading edge of the plastic shield had it's head sheared off, likely someone installed it with a pneumatic driver. What's really sad is that they don't give a damn, figure the customer will never notice, or won't know how/when it happened. This taught me a couple of things: how to extract a broken off bolt, and where not to take our car for repairs again (and to stop recommending them). This was just one item in a list of oversights by this outfit, but they were a typical example of the work quality of over-rushed "pros".

I gave up on the dealership's service department, at least for routine maintenance like oil changes, some time back. My beefs: they routinely put in 4.0 liters, when the spec. is 3.2 liter with filter change, 3.0 liter for oil change only. Also, they insisted on changing the oil filter at "Service A", which according to Honda is oil change only.

FWIW, I put in only 3.0 liter, even with filter change. This puts the oil level approx 3/4 of the way up, between low and high marks on the dipstick, and the object of the exercise is to really just to get it in that range.

It is not critical to have it exactly on the top mark, and overfill is actually detrimental: enough overfilling will reduce your mileage, since the cranshaft has to slog through the deeper oil in the pan with each revolution. Also, overfilled oil can foul various components.

I have a HCH 2008 and just

I have a HCH 2008 and just had my oil changed today to the tune of $56.00. I am only getting about 40-42 mpg tops, and am seriously disappointed. My spouse has a Toyota Prius and gets up to 60 mpg in summer and 50 in winter!!!